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Hacking Neighbor Pleads Guilty On Death Threats and Porn
wiredmikey writes "Another good reason to make sure your wireless is secured! 'Barry Vincent Ardolf of Blaine, Minnesota pleaded guilty to hacking into his neighbor's wireless Internet system and posing as the neighbor to make threats to kill the Vice President of the United States. Just two days into his federal trial in St. Paul, Ardolf stopped the trial to plead guilty. According to the US Department of Justice, in his plea agreement, Ardolf, 45 years-old, was indicted on June 23, 2010, admitted that in February of 2009, he hacked into his neighbor's wireless Internet connection and created multiple Yahoo.com email accounts in his neighbor's name." Ardolf's guilty plea included child porn possession, as well as the death threats.
First post! ...(from my neighbor's IP address; so mod him down, not me)
Some were yelling one thing, some another. Most of them had no idea what was going on or why they were there. Acts19:32
when you read TFA, it actually just sounds like he was screwing around and the child porn was more like "this'll get the dude in trouble" rather than "I have a private collection because i'm a pedo".
Either way, the dude was really stupid and deserves to get jail time for it.
edit: changed the word "article" to TFA cause that's the way it's done here ;)
The article is rather sparse on details, but what interests me is that Ardolf didn't succeed in his "this'll get the dude in trouble" plan; what led the police to believe that the access point had been 'hacked'? What security was used, for that matter? Were there logs?
The guilty plea certainly makes it seem like this is a case where computer fraud was handled correctly by the system, and since the courts often seem to make the mistake that 'IP address == person' it'd be good to see how they went about distinguishing the actual criminal from the victim here.
In all fairness, I live in Minnesota. I can vouch that there's just not much else to do around here in the winter.
There's a spot in User Info for World of Warcraft account names? Really?
The neighbors suspected the guy right away. Fortunately, the investigators listened to the [innocent] neighbors and started looking at the real bad guy.
http://www.startribune.com/local/north/112080854.html?elr=KArks:DCiUHc3E7_V_nDaycUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUoD3aPc:_2yc:a_ncyD_MDCiU
The guilty plea certainly makes it seem like this is a case where computer fraud was handled correctly by the system
Don't be so quick. Many innocent people plead guilty because they've been poorly advised by a public defender. A plea of guilty doesn't mean the person was guilty. It means that a deal was offered and the suspect had no faith in his defense at trial.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
This guy has a history of problems with neighbors. This isnt his first run in with the law
See: http://www.startribune.com/local/99435264.html
and
http://www.startribune.com/local/north/96012389.html
Minneapolis Star Tribune http://www.startribune.com/ had several stories, which you can find by searching for "Ardolf". Good stories, although not too technical.
The victim, Matt Kostolnik, worked in a law firm, and Ardolf sent messages to the firm. The law firm hired an investigator to figure out what was going on. The investigator tracked Kostolnik's wireless traffic, and fingered Ardolf. Then they sent the cops with a search warrant to Ardolf's house, which produced even more incriminating evidence.
Ardolf turned down a plea bargain on the identity theft charges alone, so they added the child porn charges and went to trial. When he saw the evidence against him, he gave up and pled guilty.
I can remember a handful of cases like this where the victim got out of it because they managed to catch the real criminal. (Wasn't there one recently in England?) I wonder how many cases there were where the innocent victim got convicted.